trying to appease other people. they tried to present it as him being, you know, a bold leader on this issue. i think in reality he knows that he's losing and donald trump is setting the tone on this issue, and i don't see that changing any time soon. >> we'll certainly watch the fallout in the weeks and months ahead. msnbc political analyst brendan buck, thank you as always. thanks to all of you for getting up "way too early" on this wednesday morning. "morning joe" starts right now. right now millions of americans are getting blasted by a heat wave. when you show the weather app it shows the middle finger emoji. >> so hat in maine the lobsters will be getting in pots just to cool down. [ applause ] it's so hot in new york this week the rats are wearing crop tops. [ laughter ] it is so hot in south dakota, kristi noem's dog -- >> good morning. welcome to "morning joe." it's a very -- going to be a very hot wednesday, june 19th. jooernt. we'll bring in the former communications director, jen palmieri and host of msnbc politics nation reverend al sharpton, and professor at princeton university. let's talk about today and juneteenth and why it's so important, rev. >> it's very important. juneteenth is really a celebration but also a reminder that after abraham lincoln had signed the emancipation proclamation in 1816 those in texas were not even aware they were freed until june 19, 1865, for two and a half years. slaves continued to work as slaves in texas until the union army came in and made it clear they were free and enforced it. the reason i think it's so important, joe, today is the issues in this election for people like me is around states' rights where you have states -- i was in florida last night trying to ban books, trying to stop women's right to choose. it's an issue still alive, states' rights guns the union, the federal government protecting women, protecting blacks and protecting history studies and other things and the ability to communicate. you when you get your news from the wrong source you can be freed and don't even know it. >> yeah. eddie glaud, it's one more striking reminder that even when progress is made, we have to keep striving to enforce those laws, keep striving to move towards a more perfect union. >> absolutely, joe. just to echo what rev just said. freedom is not an end. it's not something that happens and we can clean our hands and move forward. freedom is a practice. we have to constantly defend it in our lived relationships with each other, and juneteenth remains us of this. i want to be very, very clear. juneteenth is not just a holiday for block folk. it's a national holiday for the nation to really understand its journey on, you know, in relation to this very, very investigated question of what do we mean by our commitment to freedom, joe, and we're still grappling with that question today. >> right. still grappling with it and will for a very long time. the goal is to be moving in the right direction, and that's a lot about what the next six months is about. let's talk about off the top but what we heard which is, i mean, it is hot. it is -- it is hot across the northeast. there are record temperatures across a lot of the country. it's led to officials to declare emergencies as the heat index is soaring over 100 degrees from texas, yes, to maine. a heat dump continues to hover over the midwest and east coast. about 150 million people experienced temperatures of 90 degrees yesterday and more than 100 record highs will be possible today through saturday. even nighttime lows could bring records for heat. there also might be no end in sight. according to forecasters, most of the country is expected to see higher than usual temperatures for at least the next three it four weeks, and this should come as no surprise. according to nasa, the last ten years have been the hottest on record. jim palmieri, i -- i'm just sorry. i don't know where climate deniers go. i'm not talking about the forecast this week. i'm not talking about next week. i'm talking about what's happened over the past 20 years. one record after another record after another record is broken, and over the last ten years, in all of the years recorded for heat, the last ten years have been the ten hottest. so if you go back 150 years or however long we've actually been recording temperatures, numbers one through ten are the last ten years, and it just keeps getting worse. >> it's not just the heat. it's the extreme weather. it's the weird -- it's the weird storms, the microburst storms, and, you know, a lot of people accept that things have changed. whether or not they accept that human actions are responsible for it, and there's something that can be done about it is a big question, but there is -- it does feel that, and i think the polling shows, that people are understanding that there has been a change and it's something that people have to adapt to, but the -- i mean, i -- i think a heat dome, that's new, right? i don't ever remember hearing that term before so, you know. >> jonathan le mire, you're our practicing meteorologist here. heat dome. what in the world is that? >> yeah. i don't have my board to point to with the forecast, but we've had heat deems before sadly. >> okay. >> it's basically when the heat shows up and gets stuck. i believe the jet stream has a role here. it keeps it in place. that's what i heard from my show first about an hour ago. what it means is punishing heat for days. >> punishing heat and not going anywhere, and it's also something where it's further evidence of climate change and also disproportionately impacts the least advantaged in our country, the poor, either living in urban or rural areas and we certainly encourage everyone to stay cool as possible the next week or so and check on your neighbors especially if they are elderly or vulnerable during what is going to be a tough really few days. >> there's a weather report and also our community action bulletin board by jonathan le mire. >> i wear a lot of hats. >> you do wear a lot of hats. let's talk, jonathan, about the dustup yesterday about donald trump who can't really seem to stop from kicking the most important city, the most important city in american politics over the next six months. that, of course, is the largest city in wisconsin which is seen as an ultimate swing state. he's now backtracking, but he was, according to the chicago police, he was planning to stay in chicago during the republican national convention in milwaukee, and his about face came out after reporters found out that he was going to be staying in the windy city instead of milwaukee when it reportedly involved trump staying at a trump tower in the windy city and commuting 90 miles north. also, he can stay out of milwaukee overnight. of course, trump lied and told nbc that he had planned to stay in milwaukee all along, but hours later chicago law enforcement confirmed that they were in fact planning security for a trump stay during the rnc convention as recently as yesterday and had been coordinating safety measures about the trump campaign in person and by phone. according to the chair of the city council's public safety committee the trump campaign abruptly changed their minds yesterday and communicated with the city to say we're not coming to see the cubs after all. trump has been on the defensive about his views in milwaukee after telling republican lawmakers in a private meeting last week that the city was, quote, horrible. one week later when he's in wisconsin he's saying that he, quote, loves milwaukee. jonathan, again, you think they can handle this a little bit better but the guy obviously has contempt for milwaukee. it doesn't matter how much people spin it on fox news. i heard some people even on howie kurtz's show that it was misinformation what was said about milwaukee. not if you take what republicans were saying in the room, the fact that they were going around in circles saying oh, no he didn't say it and they found out later he admitted to saying it, back and forth, back and forth and obviously he like a lot of republicans in wisconsin have a real problem with milwaukee. >> yeah. joe, first i did meteorology and now i'll do geography. chicago not in wisconsin. >> not in wisconsin. >> chicago in illinois a state that will safely go democratic and milwaukee is the biggest battleground state in the map in wisconsin. you know, this is not new for trump. trump back in 2016, the rnc was slated to be in cleveland. he attacked cleveland repeatedly, not understanding why the rnc would be there. he's doing the same here and trump, is you know, a known creature of habit. he likes to sleep in his own bed each night on the campaign trail. flies back and forth in order to get back to mar-a-lago or bedminster, wherever it might be, and in this case he was going to go to trump tower in chicago, the toe he will there. this points to a bigger issue. the biden compare has been all along once trump returns to the campaign trail, americans start tuning in over the summer and more and more in the fall that trump will make self-destructive acts or comments. this feels like it could be one of them and even if he'llnates a percentage of wisconsin vote, maybe not milwaukee residents, the city won't go for him, but maybe suburb eastern residents who have pride in the brewers or milwaukee or whatever it may be, it's a big unforced error. >> or the bucks, right? >> sure. >> i wondered why -- i did not realize that about cleveland as well, that he would trash talk cleveland in 2016. he doesn't dish mean, this is a thing, right? he wants to stay in trump hotelsings right. like there's not a trump hotel in milwaukee and that's why he wants to stay in chicago, but list wonder if he doesn't want to be some place that he loses and if he's not loved in milwaukee and he's nod loved in wisconsin and he's lost in wisconsin before if he doesn't want to go back there, and i do think -- you know, i know that some republicans in wisconsin don't love milwaukee either, but it does seem to like get at some kind of pride of the state when you're attacking their -- you know, you're attacking their biggest city, and the more he's on -- there's a lot of crazy stuff that he said when he was in wisconsin last night. the more he's on the campaign trail the more fodder there is for this kind of thing. like what do you think about this? >> i notice he's been very selective on the cities that he attacks. they usually have black mayors and usually have a large urban community, and i had the mayor of milwaukee on "politics nation" the other night and we talked about that. you know, he never attacks certain cities who has some of the same challenges, but i think that we're getting ahead of ourselves. he has a sentencing four days before the convention, and who knows, the judge may have other accommodations prepared for him. i don't know. it's maybe unlikely, but i wouldn't rule it out. >> we shall see. stay tuned on that front. but eddie, i mean, the rev really just broke the code really. after trump trashed milwaukee, people said oh, he would never say that. okay. well, we found out that he did say that and they made a lot of different -- it was about crime. it was about the brewers' middle relievers. it was about this. it was about that. no, it wasn't. he trashed milwaukee, but -- but if you read the articles surrounding it, republicans in wisconsin have been trashing milwaukee for a very long time, and it's all the as the rev said. it's about cities with urban populations, with black mayors. republicans have always talked that way about philadelphia. oh, they are going to just sit and wait and see how many black votes they can steal in philadelphia because philadelphia is so corrupt or detroit. david frum has a piece out of donald trump trashing detroit. we heard what he said about africa and caribbean nations. he might as well say it about cities, too, where there's a predominantly black population chances are very, very good that donald trump is not going to like that city. >> right, joe. then you add that to his conspiracy theory that these are the places that led to the election being stolen. remember, when he was talking about 2020, what was happening? it was what was going on in atlanta, what was happening right in milwaukee, what was happening in detroit, what was happening in philadelphia, so it makes it difficult for him to be in milwaukee making the case, right, that the election was stolen in 2020, right, when in fact he's actually holding his convention in the very city that he thinks participated in the heist as it were, so not only is it racist, joe, it cuts against the grain of the theory that he's been spouting ever since he lost the election. >> happening right now. russian president vladimir putin's meeting with kim jong-un, and earlier today the north korean leader hosted putin for a lavish welcome ceremony with portraits of both leaders strewn on top surrounding buildings throughout the nearby sea -- streets. think washington, d.c. in 2025 in donald trump wins. it's been 24 years since putin visited the reclusive nation as his war on ukraine stretches into another summer. north korea's ability to arm russia with weapons and artillery is critical for putin's war amounts, and as both leaders face escalating standoffs with the west, we're learning they signed a deal to help each other in case the other is attacked. let's bring in historian john meachum. john, we're really seeing a shift leer. there was a long time ago that russia was largely dependent on germany and other countries in the european union to help fuel their economy. obviously china has been depending more and more on europe and the west for quite some time. you're now really seeing, quoting david frum who we just talked about in a great piece in "the atlantic" yesterday about detroit. you're really seeing this axis of evil with russia, north korea, communist china, the most repressive nations on earth that putin would like to call himself a communist leader, but the most repressive nations on earth coming together to unite against the west, to unite against nato, to unite against america and to unite against freedom, and i've got to say the most frightening part of that, i mean, because standing alone doesn't cause a concern if you look at our economic might and our military might, but the most concerning part of that alliance is that donald trump considers himself to be close friends with every one of those tyrants. >> that's the picture that we should all focus on right now. arguably the most important part of this unfolding political campaign is that the republican nominee wants to be in that frame. he wants to be walking through squares like that. by his own admission, he admirers that. he admirers that the authoritarianism. he admirers the toughness, and i would just say to all of my friends and your friends, too, who consider themselves reagan republicans, look at these images and explain to me, explain to us, why somehow or another it is in the american interest to support vladimir putin against -- against america intelligence agencies, against american interests, against the long-standing sometimes ambivalent, sometimes unsuccessful, sometimes contradictory, but persistent support of democracies around the world on the part of the united states. our collective security after world war ii was based on the idea that democracies tended not to go to war with each other, autocracies tended to go to war against democracies. that is the pattern, and it doesn't necessarily predict the future, but it's a pretty good diagnostic guide, and if you want to understand the global stakes of what we're facing, those are the images to show. >> you know, it's -- it's -- what's so remarkable here, john, is -- john meachum, is that you look at donald trump's words, and we've talked time and time again about the republicans in the clubhouse, well, sitting there, it's republican versus democrat, and biden, he's a socialist. how is your 401(k), making more money than ever? how are your stocks? breaking records every day, but he's a socialist, so, you know, i'm just going to vote for the republican acting as if this is dole versus clinton in 1996. let's look at the words, and your friends and my friends. how do they justify the fact that they are still considering voting for a guy who called president xi the head of the chinese communist party who asked him at mar-a-lago reportedly about building concentration camps for uygurs and trump offhandedly said yeah, sounds great. >> yeah. >> he praised president xi as being incredibly powerful with an iron fist, a brilliant guy with an iron fist and respected the fact that he had an iron fist and could oppress over a billion of his citizens. he called vladimir putin's invasion of russia brilliant, brilliant. i say that to all of your friends at the 19-9-hole and my friends, and then, of course, went on and on about his love letters to kim jong-un, a man who is considered to be the most blood-thirsty communist tyrant on the face of the globe. this is who your friends, some of your friends, some of my friends, some of your family, some i my family and everybody on fox news is supporting. >> it's -- it's one of the great puzzles, and i mean this. i -- i can arc the domestic side. i understand, i don't agree with it, but i understand the taxes and judges argument for domestically supporting the republican nominee, whoever it might be and, boy, we have now tested three times whoever it might be, but this one doesn't make sense to me. this is a party whose modern incarnation, most recent incarnation before the trumpification of it was ronald reagan's philosophy of the cold war. we win, they lose, right? it was a negotiating position from the former president of the screen actor's guild who called him an evil empire and brought gorbachev to the table, and the soviet union falls on george w. bush's watch without an american troop not being in a combat position, something unimagine. a it was the product, of a bipartisan coalition where we argued about the relative projection of force against soviet tyranny, but we never argued about the fact of soviet tyranny. here you have a three-time republican nominee for president, right, which is only -- nixon got it four times. that's the record, so donald trump is closing in on richard nixon and his record for winning the republican presidential nomination. we have a nominee who argues that russia is a more reliable partner than his own intelligence agencies and supports the rawest kind of aggression against neighbors which is the tenet of the international order, right? so how does, and i'm not asking this in sort of a msnbc hyperbolic, you know, moment, how does a reagan/bish republican support a republican nominee who puts not america first but putin first? how do you justify it? >> and jonathan, not just putin first over his own intel chiefs that he appointed and, of course, you asked that question, but, again, praises the leader of communist china as a brilliant man with an iron fist, praises the fact that he's able to repress over a billion of his people, that he's able to put wug yours, a million uygurs in concentration camps, kim jong-un, you know, talking about love letters and what a remarkable relationship he has with kim jong-un. again, this is -- as john said, i mean, this is what moved my family who were cold warriors all along from the democratic to the republican party. it's why my dad loved -- well, first nixon and then reagan so much, because they were tough on communists. they were tough on tyrants. they were tough on dictators like kim jong-un who threatens the west all the time, who threatens america all the time, tough on people like putin. i mean, i could go on and on down the line but john is, of course, exactl